oh mannes!

Sorry I haven’t posted for a couple days I’ve been in Cannes, France, in my head and it’s been amazing. I flew in on Virgin on a redeye and had barely put away my iPad 2 Wired article before being whisked to the Hotel du Champs with my matching weathered vintage luggage. Like I’m talking about not even in the room for a second before all of my ECD/CCO friends were banging on the door come ON man let’s GO Benicio del Toro’s downstairs and he’s got coke. Fast forward to anchors-up on the yacht, jasmine-scented Riviera air rustling my hair… all of us bros laughing about coming up in the industry when it meant something… …Pytka and Riney stories and- ohmygod is that GRAF flashing his nuts? that’s insane- bitching about who didn’t get interviewed for Art & Copy… just so good to see all my old friends, not even here for the metal, man. What’s that? Quick pic with Will.i.Am? Yeah, okay maybe one. That guy’s a marketing genius, I only took the picture because I respect his prowess for branding and not at all because I uploaded it onto my wall and tagged 18 of my friends via the iPhone 5 prototype I nabbed from Clow who was five merlots deep. Bottom line is we were there for a reason, we were changing shit, if you had attended the morning hotel lobby conference I was hosting wearing a rumpled linen outfit with a Cuban hat you would have felt it. And the work? I was on six judging panels and so flipping jazzed about some of the social engagement pieces I immediately tweeted everyone back at the office who I didn’t choose to fly to the south of France so I could motivate them. F*cking Droga5 mounted a Twitterbot on a drone glider that could launch smart bombs via text and that wasn’t even shortlisted. What a showing. What a bummer to get back but so many learnings, so many 360 degree transdisciplinary media concepts. I can’t wait to be excited for two whole weeks upon my return. Au Revoir, Cannes. Bonjour, not Cannes.

Fortune Bananas

Faithful reader Brenna Hanly suggested I do a campaign for bananas. “If milk did the whole Got Milk thing, why couldn’t, y’know, bananas do something?” I could pretty much stop the post right there as I think that’s the funniest thing I’ve ever heard, however I’ll hold a quick tissue session in my head and see if anything comes up.

Turns out milk advertising is funded by the National Milk Producers Federation, which by the way sounds like an amazing place to work. I’ve heard the top three most creative office spaces in the United States are Pixar, Google and the National Milk Producers Federation. I can only imagine the excitement and wonder that is working at the NMPF, answering to a guy like this-

-and having to explain why your report on mammalian lacteal secretions isn’t ready for publication.

Well, bananas is funded by nobody. Nobody gives a crap about bananas. It appears, after an exhaustive 3 minute Google search that bananas do not have their own governing body, they’re at the mercy of Dole and Chiquita, who are responsible for advertising like this.

If I thought there was creative freedom at The Ad Agency In My Mind, evidently I have not worked for the Japanese. I must remind myself anytime I’m feeling creatively stifled that I could easily go to Tokyo, fart on a plate and film it to much public ado.

Upon further reflection, it turns out that some people do, in fact, care about bananas.

The obvious choice here would be to recruit Ms. Stefani to be the official spokeswoman for our favorite distended tropical fruit, however I have another idea. Against better judgment, I’m drawing inspiration from my fellow creatives from the Far East, from the mystical lands of the Orient. What I’m speaking of, dear readers, is Fortune Bananas.

Man if bananas had fortunes on their peels I’d be eating one every day. Don’t lie, you would too. And while we’re at it, email me what you’d like on one of these peels and I’ll feature it on the blog. Bite that, Ogilvy- you might feel the sting of one-upsmanship, sir, but at least you’ll enjoy a healthy dose of potassium.

Tom’s of Maine Gets Real

My good friend and fellow high-level agency executive Lesley Danger Bea suggested I create a new campaign for Tom’s of Maine, because as she so poetically put it- “Tom’s is like brushing your teeth with cedar bark and moose shit. See if you can try to not make it sound as disgusting as it is.” The gauntlet has been lain. Laid? Layed.

I think the people that buy Tom’s also buy those big deodorant crystals that don’t work. I know this because I once tried a deodorant crystal. It was like rubbing my armpit with a tiny hardened silicone breast implant, and worked about as well.

I also tried Stevia once as a sugar substitute and after dumping half the bottle in it still didn’t taste sweet. And sweetener shouldn’t come in an eye-dropper, that’s just weird. This is getting me onto a tangent but i don’t care I have an issue with going green. The concept is great but all the products are shit. Have you ever used a 7 Generations paper plate? It takes 3 to hold anything. Have you ever used an organic plastic fork? It breaks when you stick it into melted butter. Melted butter, mmm. None of this stuff works, people! I just bought a bag of expensive organic dishwasher tablets that left white cocaine streaks on everything! I give up. Go to Ralph’s. Those are good products. F*ck Tom’s of Maine.

Sorry I got worked up there. Thank you, baby with a puppy, now I feel better.

Look, it’s unlike me to shy away from a challenge. My thinking is this. Dove had some success with their Real Women campaign.

Real women? Come on. No cellulite, no varicose veins, no whining and complaining all the time, telling you to stop playing video games because all the shooting is too loud. Just beautifully skinned husky ladies that were still somehow toned. I say if Dove had traction with that nonsense, then Tom’s should take it a step further. In my campaign for Tom’s of Maine, I decree only real Tom’s consumers shall appear in their advertising.

Then we launch TOMSTOCK, a music festival held in northern California, and advertise it with drum circles in Whole Foods parking lots. If you thought those parking lots were insane before, just wait.

Tom’s is on a budget I’m sure, but word of mouth will spread and we’ll get some great bands to headline. Naturally other things will spread as well because a five day music festival + gross hippies = hygienic disaster. That’s why we’re placing various Tom’s stations throughout the grounds to dispense shampoo, soap & patchouli scented lotion.

Before the final act hits the stage, we’ll introduce a brand new toothpaste flavor. Now I understand that most of the attendees might not know what toothpaste is, but judging by the flavor I don’t think they’ll much care.

This will become their greatest selling product ever, Tomstock will be an event they can repeat year after year even after Willie Nelson dies and can’t perform in it anymore, and Tom’s of Maine pleases their core consumer while appealing to a brand new demographic.

Another Ad Agency In My Mind success story.

Stop telling me how to live my life, Pringles.

I’m tired of Pringles telling me I can’t stop. I can stop popping anytime I want. You don’t control me, Pringles. What is Pringles’ deal? It makes me not want to eat those delicious chips, which conflicts me. So instead of being so angry at that stupid red can I decided to channel my feelings into a new campaign for them. I didn’t even bother pitching them I just took their business, that’s the beauty of my agency.

First I thought I’d create a microsite with a pop and locker who never stops. We’d break the Guinness Book of World Records, he’d literally get down for seventy three hours straight… but then I realized I’m just perpetuating the “Once you pop you can’t stop” line which I so hate.

I then had a sit-down with myself to question my focus in regards to my own agency. That was not pleasant, I thought I was almost fired.

Then it hit me. I must convince people they CAN stop. Pringles has to be an ambassador of hope for people. Because it doesn’t stop with salted potato slices. Battering your wife, chronic masturbation, hoarding- if you can put down these delicious chips you can do anything. Genius.

With the launch of my staggeringly awesome idea public opinion will soar and everyone will love the shit out of Pringles regardless if they’re in the highly coveted 14-26 year old snacking demographic. By the way I am positive that Pringles’ previous agency (before mine) actually broke their audience down into a snacking demographic, and then named this demographic something like Chaz. “Chaz comes home after a hard day of ninth grading and needs to pop something in his mouth, and not just that same old chip.” At which point had I worked there I would have said “I know what Chaz likes to pop in his mouth and once he starts he definitely won’t stop.” which would have assured me severely limited exposure to client meetings. And as we all know, that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

I Just Won Pepsi

It’s a big day in my head, I just won Pepsi.

Wasting no time, I sat down with Indra, the lady that runs everything over there, she’s bigger than Oprah. Not physically, just… anyway, the two of us were drinking raspberry Mojito mixers going over paperwork at my new underwater office off the coast of Maui.

She lifted her glass and asked me and I quote, “What the H did you put in this (she doesn’t curse, just uses initials)? I’m feeling very sassy.” Then she asked me about what kind of campaign I was going to do for Pepsi. I lit her cigarette then proceeded to define her challenge. Because that’s what advertising is, you define a brand’s challenge or “problem” then define their solution, no big deal. Really though all you have to do is think of a fun idea everyone likes then the client forgets they spent 10 million dollars of research and 4 months of planning global strategies. At which point everyone at the agency scrambles to retrofit the new idea into a brief to justify the ridiculous profit margins.

I pulled out my Dell powerbook and booted up my PowerPoint. The first slide was this:

The second slide was this:

The third slide was this:

This third one was an accident and I quickly slammed the cover shut and almost knocked over my Mojito.

I told her you gotta stop changing up your shit. You don’t see McDonald’s changing the M to a P just because they get bored. They don’t change from fries to yam sticks. The burgers are frozen and gross and the coffee burns people and that’s that. She seemed receptive so I continued.

“The Choice of a New Generation. That’s what people think about when you say Pepsi. Just like when you say Coke people think about ridiculous CG commercials that look like trailers for direct-to-video Disney films. Bring it back.”- me

“But Michael J. Fox has Parkinsons.”- Indra

“That’s insensitive and anyway he’s going to cure that. Forget the Foxhound.” At which point I hit a button on a remote and Justin Fucking Bieber came up on a platform through the deck holding a fog machine and drinking out of the new aerodynamically slender Pepsi can.

The Biebs did a gay little twirl, started Jersey Shore fist pumping and yelling “CHOICE! CHOICE! CHOI-” then I immediately hit the button again because he gives me a headache. The platform descended and would you believe it, Indra signed on for a 20 year contract because she said and again I quote “it doesn’t make any sense to keep switching agencies every two seconds, we need to retain our brand equity and we can only do that by keeping you as our agency of record for the next twenty years.” Then she paid me in cash, we drained the rest of our dranks and hit up a Chili’s because they have awesome ribs.

Who the hell is Otis?

So this morning Otis, the elevator company, came to me in my mind and presented a brief- because let’s face it, why couldn’t clients just hand creatives briefs? Do we really need planners? Ninety-five percent of the time we’re coming up with our own insights so *side note* that’s the reason I don’t employ account planners at The Ad Agency In My Mind. Saves me money and time spent in those boring briefs when all I do is read ahead then throw out the paper they’ve just handed me. So I sat down with the client-prepared brief from Otis and started thinking.

Every time I step into an elevator, I see the name Otis. Who the hell is Otis? I don’t know that I trust a man named Otis to deliver me up several stories. Otis sounds like what you’d name the male result of getting your sister pregnant. “Otis you git out there and trap me the juiciest possom you can git.”

I am NOT letting that kid engineer my elevator. There’s just no way. He’s drinking a beer for crying out loud. I had to find out who the real Otis is/was.

Turns out Elisha Otis, born in 1811, developed a thingie that prevents the elevator from crashing should the cables break.

He looked like this.

I can’t advertise a company when the main guy looks like that! Give me a break. First of all that beard is insane. Second of all he curled his hair with what must have been corn cobs. Thirdly that coat looks way hot and you know people sweated a lot back then. Also don’t you even think for a second I’ve forgotten his first name is Elisha.

The client totally understood, because I just told them. No bait and switch, no hinting, I just said “look, fuckers that dude won’t work- I know he’s your heritage but give us all a break” and they said you’re right, we’re paying you 30 million dollars why wouldn’t we listen to your advice? That would be crazy.” I have the best clients in my head.

So we needed a new spokesperson. Somebody that says safety and service. A figurehead people can trust. Naturally, I thought of a monkey with a British accent.

Now this is an Otis. Casting went off without a hitch, Tom Kuntz directed 7 spots, the campaign launched on all major networks in my head and Otis even did an appearance on the Today show with Matt Lauer. We developed a Facebook page for him, an app where you can monkify your face and even launched an iPad game where Otis has to keep several elevators from crashing at once. It beat Angry Birds and with my bonus I’m relaxing in Turks & Caicos.

“Shooting a Taco Bell commercial with Ruth Ginsberg.”

That’s what my Facebook status would say. Today I received the brief from my imagination to do a TV spot for Taco Bell burrito supremes. I immediately went for the low hanging fruit of using the Supreme Court in some fashion. First I thought of putting a giant burrito supreme in a judge’s robe and it would always veto every case for “not being meaty enough”.

But then I wondered how would I do the arms? Would it be a guy in a burrito outfit or would it be CG… I think outfits are always funnier. Maybe the other judges would eyeball him when they sat in an extra long session while some long-winded lawyer went on way past the lunch break and then someone, maybe Clarence Thomas (is he still a Supreme?) would sneak a bite.

The other way is to use the real Supreme Court judges, because that way I’d go on set with them, because I’m the ECD and the ECD always gets to go on set and sit in the director’s chair and pretend like he knows what the hell’s going on but really he’s just wondering how to take a Facebook picture with the Supreme Court judges, so that’s what I’d do. I’d use the real old people, put them in their Amish robes, then maybe cast Joe Pesci to do a Cousin Vinny nod- “Ya gotta be frikkin kiddin’ me yer honors, dis burrito deserves to be on the Supreme Court, it’s got two poundsa meat- anyting less is unconstipational!”

Then they all agree the burrito is indeed meaty enough to take a seat on the court.

So yeah that’s the spot.